8/26/2009 04:32:00 PM

i <3 Taylor Swift, but not her fans



At this point, most people living on Planet Earth have heard me announce this in repeated excitement over the last week - I was in the MTV VMA's video shoot for Taylor Swift's performance in September. It took place last night and lasted until around 1 in the morning... which is why now I'm totally hooked on coffee.

So, Jen and I got to the Grand Hyatt an hour early and made it into the shoot (they turned a significant amount of people away). We were part of the extras that scream and chase Taylor out of a subway station. Unfortunately, we were not dressed skanky enough to get into the more elite group of individuals who got to pose inside the subway car with Taylor before she gets chased. I kid (kinda). It seemed like selection was somewhat random but 'dressier' girls do seem to get picked more, as do guys. I guess my skinny jeans just didn't cut it, although I had a high school girl comment that she couldn't understand how I didn't get picked because she liked my top. I'm not sure whether to take that as a compliment. I guess I will since we were told to look 'between 18 and 25.' :P

Here are some things I learned through the totally brainless video shoot:
  • It's cool to do once, but it's not as cool as people think. We practiced running/screaming up the Grand Central platform staircase multiple times. PRACTICED. SCREAMING. RUNNING UP THE STAIRS. Seriously? My IQ lowered with each practice run. And the whole night was a lot of waiting. A shoot in the NYC subway in mid-August surrounded by prepubescent girls totally either builds your physical/mental character, or destroys it. >:P
  • Privileged HS girls are failwhales. I will need God's grace to perform a miracle should I ever need to minister to girls from upper West side who go to "like, every single Jonas Brothers/Miley Cyrus concert ever" and then criticize other girls for doing the same thing. Also catty girls who made snide comments about other girls (whether or not they deserved it). More than once I was tempted to either ask them to keep their lips sealed, or push them onto the subway track (don't worry, I did neither!). And once Jen and I almost got bulldozed by this petite Latina chick who was screaming out to touch Taylor at the end of a practice run. I was in serious fear for my safety!
  • I am old. Seriously, maybe I left YG at the right time. I couldn't really find any common ground whatsoever to get to know the high schoolers at my table. But I do think urban youths have different needs than suburban ones.
  • Taylor Swift is sweet. And also pretty in person. I gave her a high-five, but it was more like a soft hand grab. A girly, gentle, lady-like high-five.
  • Entitlement is a sneaky sin. At first, people were excited just to make it in. As the night dragged however and some got into the subway car shoot, people became disgruntled, envious and impatient. And I found myself thinking the same way too, before realizing what I was doing. It is so easy to have a sense of entitlement creep up on me. I need to practice gratitude for everything I am given in life. I truly believe now that gratitude is a discipline and not just an attitude.
Overall, I liked being part of the shoot just to see what it was like, and although I understand the hype (I WILL be watching the VMAs to see if I made it into 0.00005 ms of the shoot :P), it was totally an experience in which I stared at popular culture, stardom, celebrity, and realized... not my slice of pie. I didn't like the feeling of being swept up in something because everyone else is, and over something that deep in my gut I felt was completely inconsequential to things that really mattered. But I still have the choice now to attend the VMAs itself, since I was part of the shoot... and I am still planning to go. Even after all that deep stuff, I still want to meet Beyonce! I think everyone knows that I'm not deep MOST of the time. :P

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